Native azaleas are like kids.There are good ones and bad ones.Some grow faster,some speak sooner and some are just perfect.When you mention R. arborescens in Florida,bells go off.This plant really likes an area(geographical) with less humidity and will probably not be at its best in your area.There are,however,exceptions to every rule.Don't forsake the plant.Just give it time.Most will sulk for a couple of years after planting and then go wild and bloom every year.Sopme hardly ever bloom at all.Sometimes it is the luck of the draw. You should try R.atlanticum(Coastal Azalea).Also try R.serrulatum or R. viscosum for white flowers.Also seek R. alabamense(sweet smelling).R.canescens or nudiflorum will also be good candidates possibly.Good luck in finding all these however.Buy what you can get and be patient. Give your rhodos excellent drainage,high filtered light, ample water in times of dryness and don't fertilize them to death.When I plant mine ,I don't use anything but ground pine bark and a little cottonseed meal mixed with the soil. Fertilize the second year just after flowering and again about mid summer with 16-4-8.Mulch to conserve moisture. Please forgive me if this message gate"unindented"and looks out of line.This site doesn't seem to get paragraphs straight all the time.Send an email address and I will get you some pix as my azaleas bloom. Charlie

Luis, I think you might be right about the R. calendulaceum. I looked up lots of info on it and it seems to fit. I think that I was confused because when I have seen this one in bloom, it still has unopened buds on the top of the ball of blooms (for lack of a better term) so it looks more like a half sphere than a sphere. The unopened buds are much more fiery than the opened blooms. Once I found a photo like that I was convinced. I found one site that said it tends to be scraggly, especially if grown in shade and this one is. It is more like a tree, not a shrub and the branches are open and airy. The one thing that doesn't fit is that it is not supposed to be fragrant. This one is very fragrant and the scent is in the air from quite a bit away. It reminds me of honeysuckle. Perhaps this one just didn't read the rules. I also thought that it might be 'golden lights', since it is supposed to be fragrant, but I think that this one is far too tall to be that. If it is R. calendulaceum, it is supposed to be easy to grow from seed. Can I collect the seeds and do that or is it veyr difficult? I have never collected seeds in my life, so this is not obvious to me. If I do manage to grow one from this particular plant, will it be more likely to have this plants characteristics? It is a beautiful 'tree', but the flowers are so short lived that I don't know that I really could fully appreciate it without the fragrance as well. That is just so much of its charm. I am going to track its progress to see just how long they last. The link is not a great photo of the tree, but you can see how graceful its branches are and how tall it is. I am very taken by tree as you can tell. Thanks to everyone for your help. Here is a link that might be useful:

I know We-Du Nursery has had them in the past - they're in the NC mountains, but I am not sure of the exact address. They've been in business long enough that they should have a web site, where you can find out if they ship. Sandy Mush Herbs in Leicester NC, does ship and I think they have native azaleas - maybe only little ones though. Try Niche or Plants Delight, or Woodlanders in Aiken, who should certainly have them as they specialize in natives. A number of the local nurseries here do carry them, but I doubt most of them ship. If I can think of any other sources, I'll come back.

I think Nearly Native Nursery in Fayetteville would have a lot of what you're interested in. They are closed for most of the month but will reopen after February 25th. I'll link their website below. They have azaleas and viburnums. I also found a couple of 3 gallon native azaleas at Home Depot last year (they had sweetshrub too, including the 'Athens' cultivar). Lazy K is near Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, Georgia, by the way. I would not be surprised to find that Nearly Native gets their azaleas from Lazy K, many places do. Nearly Native also lists a couple of lesser known native evergreen shrubs: Dirca palustris and Osmanthus americanus. Check on wax myrtles too. I really like Illicium floridanum, but it can handle only morning sun. You can get some viburnums this weekend at the GNPS Symposium on Saturday. There will be a few there to tie in with the presentation on native viburnums. Suggestions for other sun perennials: Asclepias tuberosa (or other Asclepias, known as butterfly weed), Penstemon digitalis (beardtongue), Goldenrod (Solidago 'Fireworks' is a good one), Verbena canadensis 'Homestead Purple' (more of a ground cover), Mouse eyed coreopsis ('Nana') is a good performer. Here is a link that might be useful: Nearly Native nursery